might be said, if we looked at it from the outside only, that this is only an affair of parochial legislation, because the population of Heligoland, I think, is not equal to the average population of any of the 10,000 parishes of England. But, Sir, I wish to point out that, although the vote of the House is only to be taken upon the Agreement as to Heligoland in point of form, yet in point of substance the vote of the House is upon the entire Treaty. Now, upon that there can be no question whatever that the whole treaty-making power of the Crown is thrown into the hands of the House in respect not only to Heligoland, but to all the conditions relating to the South African portion of the Agreement, although upon the form of proceeding there is no indication whatever to that effect.
'… The question of the Treaty-making power is undoubtedly one of the most difficult questions of practical politics in the world. The proof of that is to be found in the history of the Constitution of the United States. The able and sagacious men who considered this question there, arrived at a solution of the difficulty by adopting a compromise. They gave the power of intervention to the Senate of the United States; they did not give it to the popularly elected body, and that body has nothing whatever to say to a Treaty concluded with a Foreign Power, and it has no power of interfering with the conditions of that Treaty either directly or indirectly by censuring or punishing those who have made it. No one doubts, Sir, that this power of Treaty-making lies in this country with the Crown, subject to certain exceptions, which, I believe, are perfectly well understood. Wherever money is involved, wherever a pecuniary burden on the State is involved in any shape, I say, it is perfectly well understood, and I believe it is as well known to Foreign Powers as to ourselves, that the Government is absolutely powerless without the consent of Parliament, and that that assent, if given, is an absolutely indispensable assent, upon which the Crown has no claim whatever, presumptive or otherwise. I believe it to be also a principle—and I speak subject to correction—that where personal rights and liberties are involved they cannot be, at any rate, directly affected by the prerogative of
